Post by Kiwithrottlejockey on Jun 28, 2010 15:20:06 GMT 12
Nuclear nations to meet in Christchurch
By PAUL GORMAN - The Press | Wednesday, 16 June 2010
CHRISTCHURCH will bask in the glow of the international nuclear spotlight next week.
World officials are meeting in the city over five days to help improve nuclear safeguards and stop nuclear materials falling into the wrong hands.
The closed meeting of the 46 member countries of the Nuclear Suppliers Group (NSG) will take place against the backdrop of China's controversial plan to export nuclear reactors to non-member state Pakistan, and widespread concerns about nuclear developments in Iran and North Korea, neither of them NSG members.
At the Thursday session, nuclear-free New Zealand is expected to assume the chairmanship of the high-level group of nuclear suppliers for at least the next six months.
Prime Minister John Key offered to host the annual talks in New Zealand for the first time in a letter to US President Barack Obama last year.
A spokesman for Disarmament Minister Georgina te Heuheu confirmed the meeting would take place and said she would attend at least part of the gathering along with up to 200 overseas officials.
Few other Government details were available yesterday, but the venue is understood to be the Christchurch Convention Centre.
The NSG was formed in 1974 after India, then a non-nuclear-weapon state, exploded a nuclear device and showed nuclear technology meant for peaceful purposes could be misused. The group aims to reduce nuclear proliferation by export controls on materials, equipment, software and technology that could be used in nuclear weapons development or in acts of nuclear terrorism, and by improving safeguards on existing materials.
Disarmament groups say this year's meeting comes at a crucial time for nuclear non-proliferation and disarmament, and nuclear energy, especially relating to India and Pakistan, Iran and Israel, and North Korea.
Disarmament and Security Centre spokesman Robert Green said it would be "an extraordinary event".
"It's strange that here you have a nuclear-free country hosting a meeting for all the countries that supply the nuclear industry around the world."
China's intention to export nuclear reactors to non-member Pakistan was a consequence of the pressure the United States applied to other members of the group to allow it to sell nuclear technology to non-member India in 2008, he said.
"China will be here and they have been playing a straight bat on these rules until now, but they are claiming if the US can drive a coach and horses through the rules then so can they. It's open season. It means the current non-nuclear proliferation treaty is unravelling."
Washington DC-based Arms Control Association director Daryl Kimball said next week's event was expected to start with a two-day meeting of the NSG's consultative group.
The event's plenary was due to take place on Thursday with Friday to confirm agreements on actions.
There would also be expert meetings for information exchange and licensing and enforcement, Kimball said.
www.stuff.co.nz/the-press/news/3815959/Nuclear-nations-to-meet-in-Chch
Time to act responsibly on nukes
A closed-doors conference being held in Christchurch this week on
the supply of nuclear material will affect the fate of more than
one billion people, say ZIA MIAN and DARYL G. KIMBALL.
Perspective - The Press | 11:05AM - Monday, 21 June 2010
SAFETY CONCERNS: A nearly 200-tonne nuclear reactor
safety vessel is erected at the Indira Gandhi Centre for
Automic Research at Kalpakkam. — Photo: Reuters.
GLOBAL EFFORTS to prevent the spread of the world's most deadly weapons depend on universal compliance with rules that constrain the sale of nuclear technology.
Too often, however, powerful states try to make exceptions from these rules, or simply ignore them, as a way to help their allies and to make money for their nuclear industries.
The next battle will be fought in Christchurch this week, at the closed meeting of the 46 member countries of the Nuclear Suppliers Group (NSG).
The outcome of that meeting could potentially affect the fate of more than one billion people.
The nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty came into force in 1970 with the aim of preventing the further spread of nuclear weapons, eliminating the arsenals of the states that already had them, and ensuring that nuclear energy was only used for peaceful purposes.
The importance of controlling nuclear trade hit home in 1974 when India tested a nuclear weapon built with plutonium produced by a reactor supplied by Canada and the United States for peaceful purposes.
To stop this happening again, countries that sold nuclear reactors and related fuel technologies established the NSG to agree common rules to govern such trade.
In the 1990s, the 190 member states of the Nonproliferation Treaty and the NSG agreed that to be eligible to receive nuclear technology a country must have comprehensive international safeguards covering all nuclear facilities.
Only this degree of oversight could prevent the diversion of imported nuclear technology and materials for weapons purposes.
In recent times, the major nuclear suppliers have sought to change this rule.
Seeking to recruit India as a strategic partner to counter the rise of China as a great power, President George W Bush changed US laws restricting nuclear trade with India and pressed for a special exemption for India from NSG rules.
The exemption was strongly backed by France, Russia and the United Kingdom, who all hoped to sell billions of dollars worth of reactors to India.
In 2008, the NSG agreed to the exemption, over the protestations of the governments of New Zealand, Ireland, and Austria, who pointed out that India has not signed the Nonproliferation Treaty, and does not have international safeguards on all its nuclear facilities.
As a result of the exemption for India, New Delhi is now free to import uranium for its civil nuclear programme.
This will ease constraints on uranium availability in India, enabling it to use more domestic uranium for its nuclear weapons programme.
India will also get access to modern nuclear technology and opportunities to train scientists and engineers that it can transfer into its weapons programme.
Pakistan and Israel, who are still subject to the NSG ban on nuclear trade, have sought similar exemptions.
With a powerful army that dominates decision-making and a history of war and conflict with India, Pakistan has reacted strongly.
Pakistan's National Command Authority, which manages the nuclear weapons programme, declared that the exemption for India "would have implications on strategic stability" and vowed not to fall behind in the South Asian nuclear arms race.
Pakistan has accelerated efforts to increase its capacity to produce enriched uranium and plutonium for weapons, and has blocked the start of negotiations on a global treaty to ban the production of nuclear material for weapons purposes.
Pakistan has also asked its ally China to sell it two nuclear power reactors, which would violate current NSG rules.
When China joined the NSG in 2004, it had already built a power reactor in Pakistan.
China claimed at the time that a second reactor project was covered in its agreement with Pakistan.
There was no declaration at that time of any intention to build additional nuclear power plants in Pakistan.
Chinese construction of additional nuclear power plants in Pakistan would thus be inconsistent with China's commitments to the NSG.
Nuclear trade with Pakistan, as with India, would further fuel the arms race and instability in South Asia.
At the meeting of the NSG in Christchurch this week, responsible NSG governments should challenge China's proposed deal.
They should make clear that such a transfer would violate NSG guidelines.
The NSG should also be mindful that all United Nations member states are obligated to support Security Council Resolution 1172, which was approved just weeks after tit-for-tat nuclear tests by India and Pakistan in 1998.
The resolution calls on Pakistan and India to refrain from further testing, sign the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty, stop producing fissile material for weapons and undertake other nuclear risk reduction measures.
To date, neither Pakistan nor India has halted fissile material production for weapons, nor signed the test ban treaty.
Since all NSG members are also signatories of the Nonproliferation Treaty, it is worth recalling that last month in New York treaty states , including China, reaffirmed that "new supply arrangements" for nuclear transfers should require that the recipient accept "IAEA [International Atomic Energy Agency] full-scope safeguards and international legally-binding commitments not to acquire nuclear weapons".
Approving the sale of Chinese reactors to Pakistan, or turning a blind eye to such a sale, would weaken both the NSG and the Nonproliferation Treaty.
Regardless, the pressure on NSG members to go along will be great.
The Obama Administration has objected to the deal, but not fought against it. Washington does not want to risk Pakistan's support in the fight against the Taliban in Afghanistan.
NSG governments must try at least to do no more harm.
Notwithstanding the 2008 exemption for nuclear trade with India, responsible states, like Japan and Australia, should resist commercial pressures for engaging in nuclear trade with India, which would feed the nuclear fire in South Asia.
A more substantial step would be for NSG members to demand that Pakistan and India commit to end the production of weapons useable nuclear material and allow talks to go forward on a global ban on the production of nuclear material for weapons purposes, and to make clear that all nuclear trade will be terminated if either country conducts a nuclear test explosion.
• Zia Mian directs the Project on Peace and Security in South Asia at Princeton University's programme on Science and Global Security. Daryl G. Kimball is the executive director of the Arms Control Association, a non-governmental research organisation based in Washington, DC.
www.stuff.co.nz/the-press/opinion/perspective/3833473/Time-to-act-responsibly-on-nukes
Thin line for New Zealand in nuclear talks
Thrashing out nuclear deals a juggling act for NZ
New Zealand is between a rock and a hard place at the Nuclear Suppliers
Group meeting in Christchurch this week, says BOB RIGG.
Perspective - The Press | 3:10PM - Thursday, 24 June 2010
SECURITY & HYPOCRISY: The Nuclear Security Group
conference is being held at the Convention Centre
in Christchurch. Security managed entry and exit.
— DEAN KOZANIC/The Press.
THROUGHOUT THIS WEEK Christchurch has been hosting a meeting of a little-known entity called the Nuclear Suppliers Group (NSG).
As many as 46 states are represented at the meeting, chaired by the New Zealand Government in response to a personal invitation from US President Barack Obama to Prime Minister John Key.
What is the NSG, and what role is New Zealand playing in chairing its meeting?
The NSG was established by the US government in 1974, in response to India's detonation of a nuclear device, with the stated aim of ensuring "that nuclear trade for peaceful purposes does not contribute to the proliferation of nuclear weapons or other explosive devices".
Unsurprisingly, Pakistan followed India's example. India's nuclear programme was supported by Canada and the US, while Pakistan received assistance from China.
The NSG was an informal US initiative enlisting support from a small and unrepresentative group of nuclear weapons states and developed nations.
Although the NSG claims to serve the interests of the nuclear Non- Proliferation Treaty (NPT), its consultations and decision-making are closed to 144 of the 190 states party to the NPT. It is not accountable to the decision-making organs of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA).
As the NPT imposes stringent obligations only on non-nuclear weapons states, this ad hoc arrangement serving the interests of a self-selected subset of IAEA member states further reinforces the fundamentally discriminatory character of the NPT itself.
This partly accounts for the riptide of discontent among emerging and developing states that is fast undermining support for the treaty.
The US prevented China from joining the NSG until 2004 but relented amidst the geopolitical aftershock of the September 11 attacks, and admitted China to the fold.
It was an open secret that China had helped Pakistan, its regional ally, to go nuclear to avoid upsetting the geopolitical apple cart in a volatile region that had experienced wars between India and Pakistan, as well as between India and China.
In 2008 the Bush administration proposed in Vienna that the NSG should contribute to the proliferation of nuclear weapons by approving the large-scale transfer of enriched uranium and nuclear technology to India.
This infuriated Pakistan, which pointed out that it would help India to secure an even greater military advantage.
The Bush administration risked this divisive initiative because it saw India as an ally and a counterbalance to the growing regional influence of China, and because Pakistan was unimportant in this context.
The US leadership was also rubbing its hands at the prospect of enormously profitable nuclear contracts worth as much as US$100 billion.
Although the NSG is a US creation that has generally danced to the tune of the Stars and Stripes, some of its members were aghast at this move, which threatened to open the floodgates to nuclear proliferation.
The NSG was forced to devote two meetings to this issue. To its enduring credit, New Zealand was in the forefront of a rebellious grouping of six states. The other five dissidents were Austria, Ireland, the Netherlands, Norway and Switzerland.
China broke away from other nuclear weapons states, and also expressed misgivings about the proposal. All hell broke loose within the seemingly nondescript NSG, whose murky dealings were splashed all over the world's headlines.
An independent US observer close to the action wrote that the Bush administration engaged in "nasty" tactics involving threats, misinformation, and intimidation, to wear down resistance from the six dissidents.
President George W. Bush personally called all heads of state in question, making it clear that they would regret it if they did not go along with the US.
The Netherlands, Norway, and Switzerland were the first to buckle. The remaining three culprits, including New Zealand, soon caved in as well.
China also fell into line after a call from Bush to President Hu Jintao.
The role of Germany, which presided over this diplomatic debacle, was described as follows: "The Germans apparently sat on their thumbs and let the Americans run the show."
Since 2008 Pakistan is known to have already stepped up its production of enriched uranium in a bid to keep up with India.
Also, the new Obama Administration has seen that the Bush policy of focusing on India would cost it the support of Pakistan, now deemed essential for the escalating US war effort in Afghanistan. This has dismayed India, which now, like Pakistan, feels jilted.
Pakistan approached the Obama Administration with a request for a nuclear deal along Indian lines, and was turned down. At the same time Israel has toyed with requesting the NSG to approve a comparable arrangement.
Pakistan then approached China, which has requested the NSG to approve a nuclear deal with Pakistan. China is now a superpower in waiting which even the US can no longer ignore. And the US desperately wants the support of China over Iran, for example.
The NSG will be damned if it approves a Pakistan-China deal and if it does not.
While New Zealand is chairing the decisive plenary session of the NSG, the National Party was in opposition for about a decade before it was elected into office, and lacks senior ministers with recent experience of multilateral decision-making, let alone of the labyrinthine politics of disarmament and non-proliferation.
Minister for Disarmament Georgina te Heuheu, who is attending the meeting, is a relatively lowly-ranked Cabinet minister new to the disarmament portfolio.
The conservative National-led Government has pledged to continue to uphold New Zealand's tradition of independence in foreign policy, with Key even undertaking, in a letter to President Obama, to press "New Zealand's case to play a leadership role on anti-nuclear issues".
Within the context of the 2008 meetings on the India-US deal, the Christchurch NSG meeting is testing to the full New Zealand's ability to function effectively in a murky and complex environment that will pit many of its allies and trading partners against each other.
Will the New Zealand Government align itself with the US, or will it try to accommodate China, now New Zealand's second largest export market?
Will we displease Pakistan or India, or both? Will we uphold the NPT, or will we further erode it? Time will tell.
• Bob Rigg worked for 10 years for a United Nations disarmament and non- proliferation organisation, and was formerly a chairman of New Zealand's National Consultative Committee on Disarmament. He is now a semi-retired freelance writer on disarmament, war, peace, and weapons of mass destruction, with a special interest in US foreign policy, the Middle East and Central Asia.
www.stuff.co.nz/the-press/opinion/perspective/3847592/Thin-line-for-NZ-in-nuclear-talks